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Warriors as tanks
Protection Warriors are one of the four PvE main tank combinations of class and spec in WoW. The other three are Feral Druid, Protection Paladin, and Death Knight. Protection Warriors are probably the most versatile tanks, they have the highest damage avoidance and the largest array of auxiliary abilities. Compared to the three other main tank types, warrior tanks usually create a little less aggro initially. As usual, warriors also are extremely dependent on their gear. Generating threat and holding aggro Holding aggro and Rage generation are very tightly linked for a warrior. A tanking Warrior gains Rage mostly from being hit by mobs, and uses this Rage to fuel abilities which in turn will create more threat, helping to hold aggro – and raising the damage ceiling for your DPS before they need to worry about pulling aggro. A fundamental key to understanding Warrior tanking is thus to understand how to efficiently convert Rage into threat. A tanking Warrior's group will need to help with this, as (particularly at the start of a fight) it is imperative to hold back and let the warrior establish aggro on all mobs in the pull and to generate enough Rage to keep it. Basic Warrior tanking abilities The tanking Warrior will find themselves using a small number of abilities over and over again to maintain aggro on the mobs their group is fighting. These are not the only abilities used by a tanking Warrior (certain fights might call for a tank to use almost any ability in the Warrior spell book) but they are the ones used the vast majority of the time. Sunder Armor and Devastate Sunder Armor (or Devastate for 41-point Protection-tree Warriors) is the bread-and-butter Warrior tanking ability. Unless a high-threat cooldown ability is available (Revenge, Shield Slam) it should be used to generate threat. Sunder Armor can be used at any time and is only on the global cooldown. It can be spammed (used repeatedly), which creates a lot of threat quickly regardless of weapon type or enemy. Since Patch 2.3, a tanking Warrior that has Devastate should use it in practically every situation where previously Sunder Armor would have been used, as it is functionally equivalent to Sunder Armor but also causes damage and thus more threat. Although the Rage cost of these abilities is somewhat high, it can be reduced by talents. Revenge Of all a Warrior's abilities, Revenge creates the most threat per Rage. However, it can only be used after a successful dodge, block, or parry (but as such you can almost guarantee it will be available soon after activating Shield Block) and it has a five second cooldown. Even with the extra Rage for the Shield Block, Revenge is a highly efficient threat-generating ability, especially at the beginning of combat, and ideally should always be on cooldown. The Glyph of Revenge grants a free Heroic Strike after using Revenge. This helps to create even more threat. Shield Slam Shield Slam is the 31-point Protection-tree Warrior talent. It is an extremely high-threat ability with a substantial damage component, but has a relatively high Rage cost. If Rage is no problem, it should be used whenever it is off its six second cooldown, as of all the Warrior abilities it generates the most threat. Thunder Clap Although some caution is required when using Thunder Clap, it is a potent tanking ability with a short (four second) cooldown. Unlike most Warrior tanking abilities, it is a multiple-target attack, and as such should not be used around crowd controlled mobs, as it will cause damage that will probably break the CC. It affects all targets in range, including the Warrior's current target if hostile, and causes a small amount of damage and some bonus threat. It is a crucial ability for holding aggro in any situation where multiple mobs must be kept away from DPS and healers. However, an additional benefit of Thunder Clap is in its damage mitigation effect. When affected by a successful Thunder Clap, a mob will have its attack speed reduced by a certain percentage, which is increased through a talent in the Arms tree. Wise tanking Warriors will seek to affect as many of the mobs hitting them as possible with this debuff, as maintaining it throughout an encounter can result in a considerable reduction in damage taken by the tank. Heroic Strike Heroic Strike is not a global cooldown ability, and as such can be used in conjunction with other tanking abilities. It works with a Warrior's autoattack to cause extra damage and threat on the next successful autoattack. When used on every swing of a fast weapon, it can generate a quite a bit of threat. However, it is a relatively Rage-expensive ability, as not only does it cause Rage to be consumed when it hits but it also keeps the attack from generating Rage for the Warrior to use. Many Warrior tanks only use Heroic Strike when an encounter is well underway and they have a large pool of excess Rage (50 or more) that they will lose if they do not use it before hitting the 100 Rage cap. This is generally only seen on boss fights and in raid encounters. Shield Bash Many warriors overlook the fact that Shield Bash causes a fair amount of threat – almost as much as a successful Sunder Armor – and causes a small amount of damage as well. In situations where Revenge is on cooldown or inactive and the Warrior lacks enough Rage for a Sunder Armor or Devastate, then Shield Bash should be used if possible – unless of course if the target is a caster, where it must be reserved for spell interrupts. However, on non-casters it is still a valuable skill for threat generation, well-worth mixing in with your Revenge, Sunders/Devastates, and Heroic Strikes. The tanking rotation The true art of warrior tanking is to use these (and the other) abilities for maximum effect. Generally, a tank should never simply use the autoattack, but should be using an ability every time the global cooldown is up if at all possible. Warriors should activate Bloodrage at the start of every fight, preferably immediately after the pull. After Bloodrage, it can a good idea to activate Shield Block if only to make sure revenge will be available as early as possible. Also, using Shield Block early will reduce the chance of you needing healing before establishing threat, and thus there will be a lower chance of your healer pulling aggro off of you. Since Revenge has a five second cooldown, and the global cooldown is 1.5 seconds, it's a good idea to get used to a regular rotation of abilities using Revenge every 6 seconds. While Rage is low, such a pattern might look like this … #Revenge #Thunder Clap (if enough Rage and target is not yet affected by the debuff) or Sunder Armor/Devastate #Shield Bash or Sunder Armor/Devastate #Sunder Armor/Devastate … while keeping Shield Block active at every opportunity to ensure that Revenge will remain available. This should be repeated until plenty of Rage is available, then Shield Bash should be replaced by Shield Slam. If more rage is available, as many heroic strikes should be added as possible. In the end the sequence would look something like this … #Revenge #Sunder Armor/Devastate #Shield Slam #Sunder Armor/Devastate … while working in Heroic Strikes on every autoattack as long as a sufficient pool of Rage is maintained and again keeping Shield Block active at every opportunity. This six second sequence will generate the maximum possible threat on a single target. See Formulas:Aggro for specific numeric values of the threat generated by all abilities. Multiple Mob Pulls The difference between a good tank and a bad one will be apparent in situations where the tank needs to control more than one mob. The best tanks can keep as many as 5 (or more!) elite mobs attacking themselves. The main difficulty in such a situation is to protect the healer from pulling aggro (they will be very busy keeping the rest of the group alive and thus will be generating a large amount of threat on all mobs in combat). Thunder Clap is invaluable in these situations, but alone is not enough to do the job. (Remember that, as noted above, Thunder Clap will break crowd control, so be careful as you use it.) Properly tanking a group of mobs requires regular target switching. Starting from one of the above rotations, it's a good idea to switch target after each ability usage, except for the target which is currently being killed - that one should be hit twice before switching to the next one. One advantage in such a situation is that rage is much more plentiful than in a one-mob pull. In a four mob situation, the sequence could look something like this: *Shield Bash #1 *Demoralizing shout *Revenge #1 *Sunder #2 *Shield Bash #3 *Thunderclap *Revenge #4 *Sunder #1 *Shield Slam #1 *Sunder #2 *Revenge #3 *Sunder #4 *Shield Slam#1 … and so on. Note that you may find use of Lucky Charms to facilitate holding aggro on multiple targets. By marking every single mob in a pull, you may (perhaps without even being fully conscious of it!) be able to keep track of roughly how much threat you have generated by all the mobs in the pull, and keep the mobs off your group's healer(s). The same principle can be applied to some extent in all-out AoE situations, but usually the amounts of threat caused by your group's Mages, Warlocks, etc. will exceed the tank's ability to keep aggro off of them. Thus the only realistic protection for the casters can come from themselves (e.g. Frost Nova), or from a Paladin's Divine Shield. The only possible way a Warrior has to protect the group in this situation is by use of the Challenging Shout ability, but its short duration and long cooldown means it should be reserved for particular fights or emergency situations. Taunt Taunt is one of the signature skills of a warrior, but should not normally be relied upon as an aggro holding ability. The primary effect of Taunt is to force the target into attacking the warrior for 3 seconds. Prior to patch 2.0.6 or so, this was all that taunt did, the warrior had to use the three seconds to build enough aggro so that the mob would stay on him. Since that patch though, taunt also gives the warrior the same amount of hate as the mob has on its current target. Most warriors choose to save taunt for such special situations and emergencies. There are many situations where taunt is the key to survival for the whole group. Such situations include: *aggro on the main healer *mobs without an aggro list (like Lava Annihilator, Berserkers in Zul'Gurub) *mobs with a knockback (because the knockback puts the warrior outside melee range, taunt is best used while still airborne, so the mob can be hit immediately upon landing) If more than one warrior is available, it is possible to have both tanks use their taunt alternating, to keep the mob "perma-taunted", this will allow the damage dealers to reign free. In lower level instances, Taunt is an anti-newb talent for Warriors. If you've got an inexperienced Hunter or Mage who just has to pull, Taunt means that said player can, and if you're standing in front of the group, you can use Taunt to grab the mob as it runs toward whoever pulled it. If said newb pulled multiple mobs, that can still be ok as well. Taunt the first mob, and let it hit you until you get enough rage to Sunder. Then cycle to the second mob, Sunder twice, then back to the first mob, and keep Sunder cycling as necessary. Thunder Clap can also really help there as well, but watch for CC. Talent spec and gear A warrior who wants to main tank should spend at least 41 points in protection, up to 56 are not uncommon. See the Warrior builds article for a more complete discussion. For a list of equipment, see WotLK tanking equipment (warrior). Traditionally (for example in games like Everquest), a tanks performance is determined by his amount of health (= stamina) and the quality of his armor. WoW adds to these two basic stats the avoidance stats like defense, dodge, parry and (to a lesser extent) block. The crucial difference between druid and warrior tanks is that warriors cannot hope to catch up with druids in health and armor (druids will always be superior in that respect), but a warrior's true strength lies in the avoidance stats. In general, higher health and armor make a healer's job easier - there's more tolerance for errors (or for incoming damage spikes) with more health, and damage reduction by armor is smooth and constant. Healers usually don't like the avoidance stats very much, because they give a spiky and uneven damage distribution. The problem is that the total amounts of damage reduction which a warrior can reach with avoidance and armor is the highest possible in the game, in other words, a properly geared warrior is simply the best damage soaker, better than any druid with only high health and armor. Healers who want to perform at the peak of their ability just have to adapt to the spiky damage flow. Thus the avoidance stats are an integral part of the warrior class, and an itemization which concentrates on stamina and armor alone will never realize the full potential of a warrior. Spiky damage is more of a challenge for the healers, but that's what sets apart a good healer from a bad one - a good healer is able to draw maximum advantage from the mana breaks offered by a series of dodges and parries, and is also able to quickly react to a sudden increase in damage. Stamina Despite the above reasoning, Stamina is still the primary stat for any tank. It should be as high as possible, but not at the cost of sacrificing avoidance or mitigation. Stamina is very important to a point, that point is being able to survive a round of max damage from a mob. After that, stamina simply acts as buffer for the healers to give them breathing room. Efficiency is better than a buffer! Armor A high armor class is the best source of damage reduction. It's consistent so healers love it. An equal amount of damage reduction through higher armor will always be just a little bit better than an equal amount of damage reduction through avoidance. Unfortunately, Armor has a kind of "diminishing returns" effect built in and a cap (at 33k armor), a point of armor spent near the cap is about 1/3 as effective as a point at the beginning of the curve, see the Armor article for details. One problem for warriors and paladins is that the available plate gear does not offer very much choice. There are hardly any pieces which have bonus armor, whereas nearly every plate item sports Stamina and some avoidance statistic. Druids, on the other hand, with their +360% Armor bonus in Dire Bear form, can raise their Armor values significantly higher. Avoidance 1% Dodge, 1% Parry etc. These are the stats which give an advantage to a warrior over a druid. 1% avoidance is just a little less efficient than 1% mitigation from armor. Not being hit has normally beneficial effects beyond the pure damage avoided, because some mobs can proc nasty effects on hits. Only through avoidance can warriors realize the full potential of their tanking capability. Defense The best way to look at defense is to see it as 1% reduction in damage taken for 10 points. Any warrior worth his salt should stack enough +defense to avoid taking critical hits anyways. In summary, Defense is perhaps the second most important stat for a tank. Agility and Dodge Agility is primarily useful for a warrior in its increasing the chance to dodge an incoming attack. At lvl 70, 30 points of agility will result in about a 1% increased chance to dodge, thus 30 points of agility are roughly as useful as 20 points of dodge rating. Since the amount of agility needed for 1% to dodge raises with level, agility is probably more useful prior to lvl 70, near the endgame dodge rating will prove to be more effective. Agility also increases a character's critical strike chance, but few tanking warriors will choose to rely on critical strikes to hold aggro. Block At face value, a successful Block will negate some 100-300 hp from an attack which usually does some 500-1000 damage. (See Formulas:Block for details). It is a good mitigation, and over the course of a full boss fight, a warrior can block thousands of damage. But in reality these numbers are not very impressive and will not change the course of a fight. Based on the damage reduction alone, block is a nice stat which should be taken if possible, but isn't worth to maximize at any cost. The more important aspect of blocking is that it can help to avoid crushing blows. Warriors are the tanks which can do this best. Bosses like High King Maulgar can two-shot tanks even with very high amounts of health with their crushing blows. WoW resolves attacks by using an Attack table. If the mob's chance to miss plus the tanks normal chances to dodge, parry and block add up to 25%, and the tank then activates Shield Block, this adds another 75% to the block chance. As of patch 3.0.2, the Shield Block ability has been changed to offer 100% block chance over it's extended duration, but also has a longer 30 second base cooldown, thus making it more potent, but also making its use more strategic.In the attack table, miss, dodge, parry and block have higher priority than the crushing blows, thus the mobs chance to deal a crushing blow is pushed off the attack table, making a crushing blow impossible while shield block is active. Hit Rating Some amount of hit rating is generally needed for an endgame warrior tank to stay effective. Somewhere in the range of 50 to 60 is probably enough, but some like to have as much as 70 or more. (The endgame boss fight cap is 142, after that hit rating has no further effect.) Some tanking gear has hit rating, but most tanks will need to socket yellow or orange gems that give hit rating to reach an effective level. Secondary tank The secondary tank (also known as the off tank), in contrast to the main tank, is there to do damage. They should also intercept mobs that break away from the primary tank and they care more about buffing the group. Secondary tanks tend to go for armor similar to a primary tank, but forgo a shield in lieu of a two-handed weapon. An interesting tactic for a mid- to high-level Protection warrior while soloing – build up 60 or 70 rage, then switch to the slowest two hander available (like Corpsemaker or the most amazing Whirlwind Axe), hit Concussion Blow, and then use Slam two to three times. This will deal out full damage in less than half the time. DPS Tanking For warriors, trying to hold aggro by dealing damage is generally frowned upon. It has been proven many times that a warrior trying to tank not in defensive stance, using DPS moves and wearing DPS gear is a worse tank than a properly specced and equipped protection warrior. DPS tanks will take substantially more damage and create less aggro. This way of tanking should be a last resort, only used if there's no alternative. In many situation a fully equipped protection tank will be too good for the job. If the gear is too good, the warrior will not take enough damage to build rage, and this in turn hampers the ability to create aggro. Endgame protection tanks usually have to wear some DPS gear to make them able to perform in normal mode instances. In such a situation, DPS tanks are of course better suited to the task. WARNING: Do NOT ever try to DPS tank in endgame instances. It just won't work. However, even protection tanks should use the extra abilities given by Berserker Stance where necessary. DPS tanks have to Stance Dance a lot. It is a difficult style, but makes it possible to tank for PvP meat cleavers. A pull should always be started in Defensive Stance, this creates good initial aggro, followed by a few Sunder Armors or Revenges. Then, a DPS tank should switch to Battle or Berserker (depending on how much healing is available) and start dealing heavy damage. Berserker stance In Berserker Stance, a warrior deals the highest damage, and it allows simple multiple-target tanking by spamming Whirlwind. It also makes the warrior immune to fear, even protection warriors need to use berserker stance when encountering mobs with fear. It's also a prerequisite for using Intercept. The disadvantage of berserker stance is that the warrior only generates rage from damage dealt, and that damage mitigation is decreased. Still, if specced, that way, berserker stance should be preferred over battle stance. Battle stance Battle Stance is good for generating rage, and few situational abilities like Overpower. Apart from that it doesn't really have any advantages over Defense Stance - since in Defensive Stance the reduced damage generates more threat, it evens out - and Defense gives better abilities. No shield tanking Tanking with a 2h weapon or dual wielding is theoretically possible with a very good healer and a group having a very high DPS output as a whole. Groups made entirely of casters in particular may be vulnerable to this tactic. This is however an unrealistic way to tank an endgame instance (particularly in pre-raid gear) as the initial bout of damage taken after aggro will be impossible for many healers to heal through. It may also be desirable to tank without a shield on enemies that use elemental melee attacks (a good example of this is Hydross the Unstable in SSC). Such attacks may not be blocked and therefore using a 2h weapon or dual wielding may provide a bonus given sufficient +hit and proper stats on the weapon(s). Links * List of warrior tanking equipment * GraniteMG's tanking guide * TankHard.com tanking blog Category:Warriors